Everything Boston College Men's Basketball Head Coach Earl Grant Said After Loss to CCSU

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. — The Boston College Eagles (1-2) men’s basketball team suffered a home loss to the Central Connecticut State Blue Devils (2-1) 60-59 on Tuesday night.

After the game, Eagles head coach Earl Grant spoke about the team’s performance.

Below is a transcript of everything Grant said.

GRANT: Yeah, tough loss. Central Connecticut made some tough plays coming down the stretch. Very disappointing, but you got to learn from it. Keep building.

Q: Just opting not to take a timeout with 3 seconds left. Just what was your thought process?

GRANT: It happened quick. It happened quick. I think Aidan [Shaw] grabbed the ball, threw it into DJ [Hand] and it just happened quick. So, a little bit of time left, maybe could’ve threw it to half, have .5 seconds left and have a chance to get a shot off, but it just happened quick.

Q: Coach, you went with Luka Toews down the stretch as opposed to Chase Forte. Toews, obviously, this is his first game of the year. Can you take us through your thought process with that decision?

GRANT: Luka has been practicing every day and he's been practicing hard. I thought Chase had played a lot of minutes over the first couple games and Luka’s been playing really hard. So, we rewarded him. I thought he played well for us.

Q: Not as much production for the bench tonight…

GRANT: We subbed a lot in the first half trying to figure out who could help us tonight. And tonight, our bench didn't provide the same energy and so we shrinked it in the second half and that’s the guys we went with in the second half and we came up short, but really don't have an explanation for that.

Q: Obviously a few games now seeing Aidan Shaw and Jayden Hastings starting together. What did you see tonight kind of out of their spacing? Felt like sometimes they were rolling into each other, maybe not spacing the floor as well.

GRANT: Yeah, I don't remember. I have to watch the film on that some. Thought we had a lot of stuff at the basket that typically without athleticism we didn't finish. So I thought we left maybe 12 points at the basket we didn't finish. So, I got to watch the film to see how to see that. I didn’t really see exactly what you saw.

Q: Earl, down the stretch did it seem like at times the kids were rushing it a little bit as opposed to looking?

GRANT: I thought we got a little antsy. We got up 10 in the middle of the second half and we got a little antsy. But then you say we got a little antsy, but we also had some good looks that we missed. So that can go either way and we made a couple shots and you go up 15 as opposed to them cutting the lead from 10 to 6. It was one of them nights we didn't shoot it at the level we’re capable of, but I thought we did rush it a little bit. There’s 30 seconds in a possession, work the ball, try to get it in the paint, we did some of that. That’s how we built the lead, but it's a make/miss game and we missed some shots tonight that we usually make.

Q: As you said, just seven of 34 from three-point range tonight. How much do you want to see your team kind of attack the basket more? Were you completely happy with that?

GRANT: I think at most we want to take anywhere from 25 to 30 three’s. So yeah, we probably took four or five more than we needed to take. But again, with the way our team have shown that they can shoot it, 34 ain't a bad number. If you make eight out of 34 or 9 out of 34, that's a good number. I think we made seven out of 34. You make 10 out of 34, that's a good number. So we needed to make three more threes, but we probably took too many. We want 25 to 30. We took 34. Shots weren't falling the way they typically do. And specifically for Donald, he was one for 12. That's very uncharacteristic for him, so we got to help him get to the other side of that.

Q: Coach, the 3-2 zone is kind of just a unique defense that teams run. How challenging is that for the offense to get looks against and and maybe kind of wind up making some of those antsier plays or leaving some of those points at the rim?

GRANT: I thought they probably went 10 possessions of 3-2 [in the] middle of the second half and I thought we scored on maybe four out of the 10. So, I thought it changed the game in terms of the rhythm, but I thought we attacked it pretty well. Again, it comes back to make/misses. You make a couple threes, then you think you had a great night, but we didn’t shoot the ball well.

Q: Coach, you mentioned last game more height and having that height advantage. Do you wish the team was a little more aggressive to the basket to take advantage of their height, especially in the shooting game?

GRANT: Not really. I thought we were at the basket a lot specifically in the first half and we didn't convert at the basket. So, again, you’re talking about eight points. I told the guys at the half we left eight to 10 points at the rim. We didn't finish. So, I thought we did a good job of attacking, we just didn't finish at the basket.

Q: Just defensively, it seemed like you guys overcommitted a lot on pump fake attempts and going for steals. Was the game plan to be really aggressive on that side of the floor?

GRANT: I don't know if we were as jumpy as you just described, but again, I would have to watch the film. I don't know if we gambled as much. They had 60 points and they had, for most of the game, they were about to be in the low 50s/mid 50s. So I thought defensively we were really sound, didn't make as many shots from three, and didn't finish at the rim at the level we can. But that team was about to be in the 50s. So I thought we defended well. I thought we played hard. But offensively, the ball didn't bounce our way. And nothing we can do about it at this point.

Q: Coach, speaking offensively, what can you do to kind of get this offense in a rhythm? It seemed like a lot of guys were not in a rhythm tonight…

GRANT: Yeah, I mean it's a make/miss game. That’s the only thing I can tell you. We'll watch the film, figure out what we see, and try to improve upon it.

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